A Fairfax, Va.-based OB-GYN pleaded guilty and agreed to pay a total of $5.3 million for obstructing the IRS by underreporting income and filing false tax returns.
Jasser Thiara, MD, owned and operated Midatlantic OBGYN and a pain management practice, Fairfax Pain Clinic. According to a Dec. 15 news release from the Justice Department, Dr. Thiara reduced his taxable income from 2017 to 2020 by filing returns that claimed bogus business deductions. Additionally, Dr. Thiara filed false income tax returns, failing to report hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in gross receipts. He agreed to pay more than $3.1 million in taxes as a result in the wake of his guilty plea.
In addition to these schemes, Dr. Thiara received payments for prescriptions referred to certain pharmacies from 2014 to 2016, even though his contracts prohibited these arrangements. In some instances, the pharmacies billed payers for these prescriptions but did not send the medications to patients. Dr. Thiara received roughly $2.2 million for this referral scheme.
Dr. Thiara also used a business from 2017 to 2020 called NTMT to receive out-of-network reimbursements from payers even though he was an in-network provider. He then filed returns that falsely reported NTMT received minimal to no business income, the release said.
He will be sentenced March 15.